Gro Harlem Brundtland (born 20 April 1939) is a Norwegian politician, diplomat and physician, and an international leader in sustainable development and public health. She is also a notable climate change campaigner. She was formerly leader of the Norwegian Labor Party and was Prime Minister of Norway in 1981, 1986–1989 and 1990–1996. She served as Director-General of the World Health Organisation 1998–2003, and is now a Special Envoy on Climate Change for the UN Secretary-General.

Prime Minister

From 1981 to 1997, governments alternated between Labor minority governments under Brundtland and Conservative-led coalition governments under Kåre Willoch. The first government coalition led by Christian Democrat Kjell Magne Bondevik came to power in 1997, but fell in March 2000 over the issue of proposed gas-fired power plants, opposed by Bondevik due to their impact on climate change. The Labor Party's Jens Stoltenberg, a Brundtland protégé, took over in a minority Labor government but lost power in the September 2001 election when Labor posted its worse performance since World War I. Bondevik once again became Prime Minister, this time as head of a minority government with the Conservatives and Liberals in a coalition heavily dependent upon the right-populist Progress Party.

Brundtland's maybe most famous quote is from her 1992 New Year's Eve Speech: